Word.ws English Dictionary

sadfishing

sadfishing noun: the practice of writing about one’s unhappiness or emotional problems on social media, especially in a vague way, in order to attract attention and a sympathetic response. Also the present participle and gerund of sadfish.

Noun

sadfishing (uncountable)

  1. (Internet) The practice of writing about one’s unhappiness or emotional problems on social media, especially in a vague way, in order to attract attention and a sympathetic response.
    • A report […] says that accusations of so-called sadfishing could be further harming already vulnerable children and young people with mental health problems.2019 October 1, Sally Weale, “Young people who seek support online being accused of ‘sadfishing,’”, in The Guardian

Also used as

sadfishing is also the present participle and gerund of sadfish.

Origin of sadfishing

Blend of sad + catfishing, implying that this is an exploitative and deceptive online act.

Questions about sadfishing

What does sadfishing mean?
Sadfishing means the practice of writing about one’s unhappiness or emotional problems on social media, especially in a vague way, in order to attract attention and a sympathetic response.
What part of speech is sadfishing?
Sadfishing is a noun.

Words near sadfishing in the dictionary

  1. sadfic
  2. sadfics
  3. sadfish
  4. sadfished
  5. sadfishes
  6. sadfishing
  7. sadfuck
  8. sadfucks
  9. sadful
  10. sadge
  11. sadguru

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sadfishing (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-sadfishing.wav.

Cite this entry: “sadfishing.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sadfishing. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.